We caught up with another rider we had spent time with on the previous two days. Hoss was feeling pretty good and stepping out nicely. Unfortunately, I realized I had forgotten to pack electrolyte syringes in the saddle bag. This presented a problem, but it was solvable. The first loop was seven miles which came back by camp. We didn't have a vet check, but we certainly got close enough to be able to stop back in. I certainly could not ask Hoss to complete the first 25 miles without electrolytes. He was already behind on his electrolytes, so I absolutely had to get them. Had we not been passing back by camp, I would have been obliged to turn around and go back when I realized we didn't have them.
On the first seven miles, we caught up to Laurie Birch. She commented when she headed out on trail, Hoss was tied to the trailer under his blanket and I was nowhere in sight. And now here we were catching up to them! I really can get myself and my horse together in no time.
When we came back by camp, I turned Hoss off to head back to the trailer. He was not pleased to be going back when all the other horses were going on, but he went on back.
Once back to the trailer, I leapt off and grabbed three tubes of electrolytes. The vet check would be back at camp, but I decided I wanted extra, and didn't want to take the chance I'd forget to get more after our hold. We were only in camp a few minutes before I got back on and we headed back out.
Hoss was not happy. He did not want to head back out. He seemed to be of the opinion that if we headed back into camp it must be time for a hold. It took quite a bit of convincing on my part to get him back on the trail, but he was mad. I couldn't get him to move out more than about 6mph. Now that all the other horses had gotten ahead of us, he felt unmotivated.
The next part of the loop was 18 miles down around a "lollipop" and back up again. The hills were quite steep, and Hoss was really unhappy at this point. At one point he really started to die and, frustrated, I decided to get off and lead him down the hill. Perhaps, I thought, if I led him some, he would start to perk back up. I spent a lot of time not riding my horse that day.
At the bottom of the hill, I clambered back on, with some difficulty, and I allowed him to walk until we got to the wider road. I got him moving on, but I had to really keep after him. Approaching the next water, I let him have a good drink and gave him a second dose of electrolytes. I'd given him the first dose about three miles back out of camp. I decided to try giving him electrolytes about every ten miles to see if that would catch him up.
We made our way around the "lollipop" and by the location of the vet checks on the previous two days. The head vet was camped out here for a "trot by" check. I had a hard time keeping Hoss going for the trot by part of the check, as he was convinced there should be a vet check. I kept him going long enough to satisfy the vet, then let Hoss go to the water. He wasn't really interested, so I turned him back to the trail, but he was still sure it had to be a vet check. It took a little effort, but I got him going.
We got back to the killer hill we'd come down, and I started riding him up. I decided to bail off and tail him up for a break. Like I said, I ended up spending a lot of time not riding my horse.
Horses were now coming back down to do the loop the second time through for the finish. Hoss found this somewhat confusing. He thought he should be going the same way as the other horses. By this point not only were horses going the other way, there were horses passing us going the same direction, except they were "lapping" us.
Once we'd gotten back up the hill I got back on and got us trucking along. It took effort on my part, and I really had to keep after him, but we kept moving.
We got back to camp and vetted through. I took him back to the trailer for the hold and gave him an electrolyte bran mash as well as a good deal of hay. I made myself some lunch and sat down to wait out our hold.
At the end of the hold we got back on the trail, with some reluctance on Hoss's part. But once we got out, he got his groove on. The third dose of electrolyte he got at camp during the hold really seemed to help. He seemed to turn the corner and start perking up.
This time I was able to ride him down the hill. He kept going, albeit slightly slower than I would like him to go. After another ten miles, I gave him a fourth dose of electrolytes. By now the temperature was starting to drop, and between that and the electrolytes he was starting to feel much better.
We passed the previous days' vet check area, this time with little incident. Hoss seemed to realize it couldn't be a vet check. There wasn't anybody there! So we stopped to see if he wanted a drink (he didn't) and continued on our way.
Back up the hill we went. This time I was able to ride him. Which is good, because I'm not sure I could've gotten on him one more time.
We ended up finishing in something close to 10 hours, much slower than I really thought he should be going, and dead last. But, we finished.
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